Cult of the Lady Lord
by AdamiteAshes
Summary: He falters; she suffers; he atones; their story intertwines through time. Whereas Kagome once spread warmth and light, frozen by Sesshomaru's callous sin, it is now he who must save her. Finally he realizes his true desire. Is the loving Kagome still alive within that cold exterior? Their paths cross time and time again, and each time their roles change, with hope for the better.
1. Shattering Heights

**One**

**Shattering Heights**

She tossed and turned in her fitful sleep, raven tresses flaunted wildly about, crowning the face of youth and innocence. Slender small fists curled and uncurled while rosy lips silently parted. Delicate lashes that swept dewy cheeks and the peaceful rise and fall of her bosom confirmed that she was, indeed, in slumber.

What was she dreaming of now? Did he have any place in her shadows?

Golden eyes glowed in the darkness, skimming with disregard over the sleeping faces of the half-breed, the monk, the slayer, and the fox. Even the twin-tailed cat had succumbed to sleep. His gaze returned quickly to his object of desires, the lovely angel that would become his salvation, his prey.

Would she, in all her selfless compassion, sacrifice herself?

What if he told her, that soiling her mind and body would fill the bottomless abysses in his heart?

She was the chosen sacrifice to the dark lord within him, the pure flesh that would keep him sane.

Would she willingly let him destroy her, by his twisted logic?

It mattered not; he would take her anyway, and her fear, her struggles, would only fuel the darkness within him further.

"Kagome," he spoke to the silent night, the darkness in his voice rumbling like a distant storm, whilst his expression remained barren and cold.

Leaping with inhuman grace he landed soundlessly besides her makeshift bed, gathering her prone body swiftly onto his lone arm. Touching her was always a shock, the barest contact sending invisible shivers down his lithe, steel-built frame. It was akin to a corpse touching life, a frozen man finding flame, the way her soft body flushed with warmth against his marble sword hand.

Tonight, he would smother her flame. Tonight, and he would hesitate no longer.

"Mama, I can't go back," the girl mumbled in her sleep, speech slurred from slumber.

He froze, a pale statue in the night with moonbeams upon him like silver arrows, piercing him and his black, stony heart for desiring to harm such a goodhearted beauty, that even the moon wished to protect her. His marble chiseled visage shimmered handsomely beneath the silver onslaught, yet for that rare moment his narcissistic pride fell away and he could only awe as the girl he held shone with angelic light and sweet peace upon her face.

Why did the others not see her value? Did they not sense the goddess-like allure that overflowed from her?

Or was it only him?

It was once said, that love changed the eyes, and brought the utmost adoration. A loved one became attractive above all others, for in deepest love the heart only recognized the one, _that _one. It was love—true, senseless love.

His heart recognized her, her and only her, would only accept her; and yet…

Only because she was the ultimate prey.

Only because she already attracted him.

His stony heart knew not of love, felt no warmth from the ravenous darkness within its abysses. It felt so cold, so empty, until both his heart and body became numb without life or fire.

Except when near her.

A clawed thumb swept lightly across one cheek. Silently he watched her sleep, the velvet of her skin skimming teasingly across his one digit with electrifying contact. If only he could hold her a little longer. Then he would allot her more time to live.

Releasing her back into her bed he dashed into the silent night, melting back into the shadows once more. Even the moon could not find him. He left the warmth of their camp, the warmth of her bedside. Let her sleep; he could linger no longer.

Tonight, her flame would safely burn once more. Tonight…was not his night.

In his haste to leave her, he missed the movement of those sweet lips, a single name uttered with her angelic voice from the shadows of her dreams. His name.

"Sesshomaru."

* * *

Clawed fingers scraped lightly across old, worn wood. Golden eyes watched with disinterest as thin flakes of enchanted material curled and crumbled under his idle onslaught. Unreadable gold flickered and churned with malicious thought, dark desires and wicked excitement.

Was she finally coming back?

Was her time finally running out?

When would he finally be able to subjugate her?

She would be so much safer in that far away place which he could not reach.

"Foolish human," he couldn't help but release a murmur that vibrated through the heavy silence like a single mighty stroke on a bass drum before battle.

Kagome. The girl named Kagome. The girl who would soon become woman.

Clawed fingers scraped slowly across the Bone Eater's Well rim, raising an ominous hiss that drifted through the silent clearing, a hiss of enchanted wood burnt by corrosive acid.

She stirred his desires. It excited him.

Potent, poisonous blood boiled beneath his porcelain pale skin, pumping rapidly around his stony heart.

On the outside he was indifferent. One the inside…he hadn't felt so wonderful, so _alive _in centuries.

Ironically, it was her utter brokenness that challenged him, her unknowing, tempting invitation to taint her, break her, crush her.

Liveliness and love seeped from every inch of her human body, overflowing. Had he ever before met so lovely a creature? In a weak human body, a goddess's spirit surely must have been misplaced, filling the mortal flesh to the brim with willpower. Her fearlessness and naïve compassion annoyed him and aroused him to no end.

Golden eyes tinged crimson.

How could a human body be so exquisite? He saw her lithe yet supple frame, viewed her from afar, desired no less than to throw her down and have her slender legs and shapely breasts writhing beneath him, her bright features contorted in agony. Each inch of her, from those delicate yet bow-trained fingertips to the gentle yet firm crease of her brow drove him to the brink of madness.

He could picture her now, frowning lightly at some opposition, offering peaceful compromise but fighting with ferocity when provoked. Their first meeting flashed before his eyes: her unique connection his father's fang, her irritatingly provocative fearlessness, her bold challenge; and yet when others before her had died for their disrespect, she defied his jaded attempts at eliminating her and dared to challenge him time and time again.

Not a single time had she suffered for her defiance. Death of course not, else he would be free of her distraction already. But he had yet to make her sport a major wound, not even giving her a scratch.

Did he want to hurt her? Of course he did.

Why was she still alive and well? Somehow she had evaded all his attempts.

The wooden rim glowed beneath his claw tips, warm to the touch. Her scent, light as it was, drifted from the world beyond the well, gushing towards his sensitive nose like an intoxicating storm, an enveloping fog. For a moment he was perfectly content, as much as his cold, hard heart could be

Frowning to himself, he shook off the warmth from merely feeling the hint of her presence.

He despised her, no doubt.

His satisfaction would only come with using and breaking her thoroughly. Contentment? He felt no such illusion as contentment. Her presence did not excite him, lighten him, warm him, soothe him. What he itched to do was ravish and ravage her…

Her fragrant scent and gentle aura hit him full force as the floor of the Bone Eater's Well connected with her homeland world. His golden eyes widened and his breath hitched in his throat. Five fingers dug into old wood, leaving five deep craters where they sank.

Here was his chance, to grab her with no one to protect her, and have his way with her.

Blinding light erupted before his golden eyes, his concentration already broken. Her presence overwhelmed him with the suffocating desire to let go, have peace. As he imagined her, smiling calmly in front of him, her gentle aura accepting the demon in him, his fingers slid petrified out from the wood rim.

_She was here_. His stony heart faltered.

Another time, then. Another chance forfeited, one of countless many.

He turned and flew, anxious to flee that contradictory presence, which drew to surface so many unwanted reactions from within him.

His stony heart quavered once more.

* * *

Higurashi Kagome yawned, stretching cramped limps and languidly arching her back, thrusting forward her assets unknowingly from her seated position in front of the nighttime campfire. The scrap of ruffled green cloth around her waist hitched towards her hip as she leaned forwards to stand, leaving creamy, slender legs all but completely bare.

Had she no sense of self preservation?

The attire was worse than a whore; even then, a whore would wear layers that left room for imagination and attempt at seduction, concealing the vitals of a woman's body.

This girl, however, in all her outrageousness, wore what left little to imagination, revealing the parts that he desired to brand, to conquer. A pale, tight fitting shirt slid up her waist, uncovered the smooth yet firm plain. Her little green skirt rumpled uselessly across the top of her thighs.

Yet still her apparel reflected her absolute purity.

A whore dressed to appeal to men, carefully bidding her body for the highest price.

Kagome dressed without care, ignorant and innocent to the reactions she provoked.

So pure, so untouchable, so sheltered from the darkness of the world.

He would teach her, teach her in a way that she would never forget, in what short time he would allot for her to remain alive.

Now. Soon. Sometime. Perhaps…

His claws dug five bloody points in his palm, staining the porcelain white flesh with red rivulets. He glanced at the sluggish stream of blood, thankful for some distraction from the lovely priestess.

He imagined it was her blood, flowing down her pale flesh, dripping down in a masterpiece of macabre as he carved his everlasting mark onto her mortal body. He pictured her blood of purity trickling down those uncovered creamy thighs, as if weeping bloody tears for lost innocence.

Red rivulets streamed and fell, and fell, and fell until red jewels splattered against the earth…

His lovely object of obsession stood up abruptly and inspected her surroundings with a startled expression, snapping him out of his sick reverie.

Had she heard him? Had she sensed his presence?

Her stoic stalker hid in the shadows watched with silent relief as she merely grabbed a few belongings and left the safety of camp, careful not to wake her friends. Naively confident in her abilities to protect herself and trusting of the world, she walked into the darkness.

Right into his clutches.

"Sesshomaru?"

Her vibrant voice, toned down and careful as it was, tore through his cloak of darkness. He whipped around, for once startled. Here he was the one observed, instead of being the observer. This one slip of a young woman had evaded his senses while he let down his guard in a moment of despicable reverie.

"It's you, Sesshomaru, thank goodness," her voice came closer, closer.

What was she thankful for? He was the one she ought to fear.

"I wanted to ask you," she shuffled in front of him. He left his expression blank, indifferent, what she interpreted as impatience.

She paused as if at loss of what to say.

He acted as if ignoring her.

"Um," she cleared her throat, "It's actually been a while now. But I've been…feeling your aura," she said thoughtfully. "You seem to always be around me, close by."

Sesshomaru stopped, but the girl did not notice him become stiffer than usual. Something sank and got caught in his chest. She _sensed _him. All those times he stalked her, she more or less _knew_. In the day. At night. When she slept. When she bathed. Sometimes further. Sometimes only a shoulder's turn away.

"…and so I was wondering if you needed, er, help of some sort. Medicine, or information maybe. You _did _save us before, so please don't hesitate to ask me for something."

His lips curled into a small smirk, stifling a snort. She thought he followed her with a request.

Such _innocence_, it was ridiculous. Annoying. Irksome. Hateful.

He would strike now.

"So why were you following me?" she asked, unaware of his intent.

"You wish to know?" he replied, golden eyes gleaming.

"Yes?" she shuddered, instinctively aware of thinly veiled danger.

_Finally._

"You truly wish to know?" Sesshomaru stepped closer, true to his nature as apex predator, each soundless step reciprocated by her slow backing until she hit an oh-so convenient tree and could move back no further. Trapped. She was his trapped prey.

She did not answer him this time, doe-like eyes wide with surprise, her petite body shivering with the heavy press of his aura. Each unhurried, slow and silent step closed the distance between them until he could feel her aura rising futilely to fight him.

_Finally._

Fangs slipped from his chiseled lips, thirsty for her thick life liquid. Red seeped into his smoldering golden eyes, his sanity teetering at the brink, driven by the closeness of her presence.

Too close. Soon he would become a monster of lust, madness, hatred, thirst.

Seizing her he crushed her to his chest, crushed her yelp of surprise. He needed to bring them far, far away, where none could save her. Molding her plush softness merciless against him he fled like wind set free, until the world around them became of blur of black and grey, to a place that no one, no one could reach, where none could save her. Not even the moon could see her.

Finally, finally, the sacrifice could begin, and the dark lord within him he could unleash, upon her pure body and into her mind.

Her sweet screams became his melody.

* * *

**_Cult of the Lady Lord _swam in a corner of my head for the longest time. I wanted an understanding, loving Sesshomaru, one who would follow Kagome through time. But I wanted something darker and drastically different from the sweetness and fluffiness in _Golden Spiral_. Sesshomaru would slowly progress, like he does in the anime/manga. Kagome would suffer, but refuse to be victimized.**

**Then I wanted something even more different-not just some rape scene and then reconciliation. I wanted to set up scenarios, have them play different roles, change the settings.**

**This first chapter has a more conventional scene. Sesshomaru is confused. He accepts everything as hate. More is yet to come.**

**Hopefully you'll stay tuned!**

**AdamiteAshes**


	2. Denial of Respite

**Warning: **The following content will contain mature and possibly disturbing acts, hence the rating of this story; however, it is advisable that the entire selection be read in order to understand the progression in _Cult of the Lady Lord_. The mature section does not include inappropriate words.

**Two**

**Denial of Respite**

It was heaven, he thought. As close to salvation as his deprived soul could reach, buried within her untainted flesh.

The stony heart within him jerked with each one of her screams, while his body shuddered with earthly bliss, until his entire being floated in a warm sea of euphoria. A warm sea of blood—her blood.

Her arms and knees must have bled from the friction, the slam of flesh against flesh, steel against softness, her exposed backside plastered against his front from the uncontrollable secretions of her bashful, untried body. She shuddered and cried with the uniform thrust and roll of their hips as he plowed into her, sowing the seeds of his sin within her fertile depths, muffling his roars in fragrant raven locks. Clawed hands gripped the firm, luscious creamy globes that dangled from her as she crouched, feeling the weight in his large hands, kneading the soft playthings with bruising fervor when he lost control over himself.

Sesshomaru opened pleasure-shut eyes, revealing shining citrines. They were simpler this time, merely golden orbs glowing with satisfaction, without the usual harsh, intimidating barrier when he reined his desires in. Now was the time to release those desires and indulge in a moment of freedom from his own control. The lovely human beneath her would absorb the full force of his destructive release.

He was a mortal creature. He immersed himself in worldly conquests. He fell to worldly pleasures.

Kagome panted against him, her creamy skin glossed by a thin sheen of sweat, forced by his demanding conquest.

In a lapse of lustful softness, his callous hands tenderly caressed the curves and expanses of her soft human body, waiting for her to catch her breath. He longed for the night to never end, for the moment to freeze in time forever before he ultimately disposed of her.

She shuddered in his embrace, her eyes tightly shut in terror, sealed by a shimmering rim of unshed tears, gathering on her lashes like crystalline pearls.

His stony heart quavered.

Where was the hate? The anger? Where had the darkness gone? In their place remained only lust, bottomless desire.

Pulling away from her softness, despising the loss of contact for even that moment, he immediately pulled her onto his chest in a seated position. It reminded him that he'd lost a precious arm; but even then he could summon no anger. Lightly he kissed away the salty jeweled rim around her eyes. A claw brushed away stray bangs.

"Kagome," he murmured, his voice rumbling from his chest. She shuddered again and from the contact of their bare skin he could feel tiny gooseflesh raising itself on her slender arms.

Capturing both her small wrists in one large hand he pushed her onto her back once more, feeling the fire flaring within him to greater heights.

"Kagome," her name fell from his tongue as a strangled groan, as her warm, wet depths slowly sheathed him. Her eyes opened dazed, glazed and glassy as she felt his unfamiliar, unbelievable gentleness when he used her body, in such a cruel act. His equally glazed eyes captured her with his gaze, so that she could only helplessly stare at the demon atop her.

Demon. He was a demon. A bloody, cruel, unfeeling monster.

Gentle strokes became animalistic thrusts, soft touches became rough with passion. As when he first plundered her virginity that moon-lost night, the dark lord within him took over viciously and with delight. Evil radiated in his heavy, overwhelming demonic aura, strangling her priestess light and corrupting her holy aura like poison poured in purest water.

His growls of satisfaction melded with her hoarse screams of pain and forced pleasure, the molten amber of his eyes thickening and darkening until they seemed like golden pools of blood.

Blood. Her blood. Her pure, virginal blood. His clawed hand released her chafed slender wrists to cup possessively where they joined. A long finger slid through the slickness there, moistening itself with the heady liquids and sweeping through the thick fluids that lubricated her velvet thighs. Rust, salt, and musk clouded his senses with the crazed desire for more, even more of her, closer, closer still.

He drove into her fiercely, flesh against flesh, his neediness unleashed with monstrous insanity. The lovely creature beneath him, so calm and diplomatic mere hours ago, mewled and whimpered against his ferocious onslaught, her screams spent by his tireless ravishment. Instead of writhing beneath him her body lurched uncontrollably, mortal muscles worn by his inhuman drive. Her body convulsed, sore but still tantalizing as if inviting him for more, faster, harder, as she fell back with no choice but to accept the attentions he dealt.

Sesshomaru gripped her tightly against him as he felt something within him snap. Resting her upon his shoulder he accompanied her floating in the sea between ecstasy and agony.

"Please," she whimpered, a plea for him to stop—or to not let go? She was cold, oh-so cold, and in her fragility could not leave the furnace that was him, despite whatever her qualms were.

With the dark lord within him sated, her priestess aura already ruined by his demonic one, Sesshomaru allowed her a moment of respite.

She was worn. He saw the purple marks, the maroon scratches in neat groups of five when his body overcame his mind, on her breasts, her collar, her belly, her thighs. He saw the redness caused by his fangs when his lips memorized each and every inch of her form.

He swore to himself that he would hurt her.

He left no permanent mark, nothing that would linger for more than numerable days.

For the first time in centuries, Sesshomaru realized that he had lost. Defeated by a human woman, a girl he made woman.

Physically he had endured losses of power in his early youth, to those with more experience and training. Yet pride filled him to the brim, and pride steeled his willpower, made him undefeatable. When deterred he struck again, with determination that boosted his pride in an upward cycle.

But this young woman, passed out against his shoulder, wavy raven locks tousled and highlighting her still child-like innocent features, she crippled his determination.

She sated the darkness within him.

He could not hurt her, not now…he lifted a claw to brand her skin with corrosive poison, but his hand faltered and dropped, leaving her in painless sleep.

The stony heart within him quavered. The stone crackled.

Softly he pressed a kiss to her rosy lips, her face peaceful and no longer contorted from his ministrations. Sesshomaru knew, that even after this night, the utmost purity of her spirit remained, a spirit so majestic that it shamed him for even attempting to corrupt it. He lost completely.

Could they possibly forget each other, and what occurred between them?

For her it would be a horrific nightmare.

For him it would be an everlasting source of peace and warmth.

Carrying her still body and speeding through nighttime blurs of black and grey, he left her at the bottom of the Bone Eater's Well.

He wished both that she would never return, safely far away from him, and that she would come back as her old self, the fascinating object of his desire.

But how long, then, would he have to wait?

* * *

"Inuyasha, sit!" her annoyed shout rang in the air, slightly sharp to his sensitive elfin ears. The young woman closed her eyes in irritation, her luscious breasts heaving in deep breaths lest she buried the half-demon alive in her bout of anger.

"Why'd you leave without asking? You could've been real fucked without protection," his half-brother retorted from the personal Inuyasha shaped crater.

"Sit!" Something in her voice was tenser, Sesshomaru noted with some measure of satisfaction. His half-brother had spoken closer to the truth than he would ever realize.

"He's just upset, worried about where you disappeared to and acting like the jerk he usually is," the slayer placated. "Are you fine, Kagome? Why did you leave?"

"I'm fine. I just remembered something important at home and needed to go back," Kagome lied.

From his perch in the shadows Sesshomaru could see into her expressive eyes. She had faltered in her reply. Her eyes were shielded, dark with unspoken sadness. Apparently the monk noticed too.

"Lady Kagome," the lecherous holy-man placed his hands on her shoulders, "If you feel unhappy, I will banish it with my attention. Come," he grinned with innuendo, "will you bear my child?"

Kagome laughed and shook his hands away, her laughter melodious but empty and lacking. She gazed wistfully into the shadows of the forest around her, her eyes distant, her body trembling so lightly that only Sesshomaru could see, remembering her petite form trembling skin to skin that night in his embrace.

She had not forgotten the night before either.

Yet despite the traumatic experience she returned to her duties within a day, wasting no time to wallow. She hid the story of her assault from her friends, yet unwilling to share her suffering. Why did she hide? For pride, or for fear?

She smiled again, genuine this time as she fed colored sweets to the fox-child, reigning in any depressed emotional consequences of rape. Her rape. He raped her.

Sesshomaru felt a sudden urge to flee her presence. Too spirited, too beautiful, too compassionate, too strong—she surpassed him, many times over. Suddenly he felt like a sick, depraved bastard, powerless against the darkness within him.

"...Oi, Kagome, where's the shard in this bastard? How many has he got?"

"I don't know."

"What?" four pairs of eyes turned to the calm priestess in exclamation.

"What the fuck, Kagome!" Inuyasha exploded, furiously decimating the demon with shards, turning then on her.

"I lost my powers," she stated simply.

"How?" his half-brother asked venomously, with promise of vengeance.

The girl shrugged.

"Then why the fuck are you still here if you can't do a fucking thing and have no fucking use to us anymore?" Inuyasha vented.

"Would you like me to leave then?" Kagome intoned flatly, turning to depart.

The aura of the shard-hunting group wavered noticeably. Kagome was their core, their source of love and life, the string that tied them all together. Without her their lives would lose salvation from darkness. Each member reached out to pull her back.

"W-wait, Kagome! I-I'm sorry," his half-brother hastily pulled her arm. "Don't leave us."

"We'll manage," the slayer added. "It won't be the same without you."

Having seen enough of their warm camaraderie Sesshomaru turned his back and flew. Away then, to a place far, far from her, where she would never have to encounter him, and relive her nightmare. Her eyes that day seared into his memory like a brand, the brand he intended to mar her beautiful flesh with but failed.

From his unequalled memory he summoned the image of the young woman, perusing each inch of what skin she revealed beneath the same old uniform of white and green.

There the bruises lingered, unseemly dark blotches. There his scratches remained, suspiciously claw-tip shaped. Lightly reddened hints of fang marks peeked up from her collar.

He saw her face, her eyes, the many layers of emotions, as contradictory and confused as he was too. He saw obvious melancholy, sorrow, masked by benevolence and cheer. Her eyes reflected a cove of secrets, the dark depths of an ocean, swimming with unseeable creatures—shame, anguish, mortification, gloom.

And longing.

Longing overpowered the darkness in her eyes, darkening them with a different kind of darkness that was _desire_.

The possible implication pierced him like a physical, purifying arrow shot by her dainty trained hands. Longing. Desire. He scowled and shook his head. His memory was failing him.

They were not meant to be, and she would never, ever accept him.

He wanted to destroy her thoroughly but failed. It was over.

Sesshomaru left their happy presence without turning back.

* * *

**Sesshomaru isn't at his worst right now. The most hurt he causes comes up in the next chapter; from then on his character develops into a more understanding, silent one. The setting is currently still the basic Feudal Era setting as well, and that, too, will change soon. For now, just consider this as the end of their happy, peaceful days, right before disaster. Thanks for the reviews and following, everyone!**

**AdamiteAshes**


	3. Nothing Hurts

**Warning: **The second half of the chapter will contain mature and possibly [even more] disturbing acts, hence the rating of this story; however, it is advisable that the entire selection be read in order to understand the progression in _Cult of the Lady Lord_. Thank you for reading.

**Three**

**Nothing Hurts**

"I will swallow your full demon power."

"Then die," his level, deep voice uttered with chilling darkness, as if of a disinterested god summoned from the depths of hell.

Malicious green light and raw power lit up the skies.

Sesshomaru stepped out from the mountain of dying coils with the slow, confident leisure of a toned killer, born with natural cold blood, as his opposition's gargantuan body fell apart behind him.

Pieces of tentacle sizzled and decomposed around him, offending to his senses but harmless. He turned back at the unrecognizable, disintegrated remains of the evil spirit named Magatsuhi, the manifested soul of the demon within the Sacred Jewel.

_This_ was the resentful soul that offered power to demons in exchange for their sanity, pitting them against each other for mere slivers of a trinket. _This_ was the power he refused to accept, seeing through its temptations. Even the half-breed, younger son to his sire, had desired the jewel, the soul of that worthless mountain of flesh which Sesshomaru destroyed moments ago.

A disgrace, he thought with distain.

Sesshomaru had not thought of Inuyasha as of late. Thought of the half-breed led him to more tantalizing, more striking memories of his half-brother's companion, the lovely young woman named Kagome. The desires she stirred within him, at the mere thought of her name, the way her sight, scent, and touch revived in his memory, troubled him no less than before he forcefully took her.

His heart shuddered. For a thousand untold reasons Sesshomaru buried his memories, focused on the present now and then.

His life always focused on the present. A great demon's life spanned many human lifespans, by tens, hundreds of times over. The moment he acquired a thinking mind, attained consciousness and existence in the world, Sesshomaru promised himself that he would leave nothing behind, nothing in his long past to linger upon. He never looked too far, never pushed fate, allowing no future to be prospected. He was a warrior of the purest sort, a machine amidst the murder in the center of bloodshed, not behind or beyond it, leaving a trail of blood and bones through time.

Hence Sesshomaru lived a simple life, conquering, killing. It satisfied him despite the insignificance he contributed to the whole of time.

Demons were solitary creatures, born from the distortion of natural laws, absorbing demonic energies from heaven and earth. They had straightforward goals, one-sided ambitions. It kept them from ending their own lives in the seemingly endless daily, yearly, century progression.

What was the purpose of his? Why did heaven and earth birth him?

Cold wind danced across his bare left arm. If he had been human, perhaps it would have sent shivers up his flesh; but he remained indifferent and motionless with an iron arm of demonic power. The silk tatters of his sleeve brushed across his upper arm, the place where limb and shoulder joined, whole and unscarred once more. The muscles rippled there as the new arm flexed unconsciously, inhuman strength beneath a pale, almost frail-seeming exterior.

That was all—the exterior. A thin sheet of beauty, to mask the ugly, depraved darkness within him. His pale exterior, mistaken by some to be sickly and weak, attracted the attention of fools—human rogues who considered themselves stronger, fooled by his disguise. Demons knew better than to challenge him; for among demons, none could surpass him.

The most beautiful exterior concealed the deadliest interior. After a certain point the usual ugliness of lesser demons morphed into a body more humanoid, more recognizable, until they surpassed even humans themselves in beauty. What then? They were the strong ones, the most despicable ones. And he was the worst.

The fingers of his left hand curled, diamond claw points digging into his sword handle. The runic patterns running down the silver grip tickled his fingers as his tightened his steel hold. He could feel his fingers again, his wrist, the forearm, the elbow, his entire lost limb. It had been too long, those couple months since his worthless half-brother severed his left arm. In a reflexive movement his swung the blade in his hand, a bolt of corrosive, infective green lightning that turned the remains of Magatsuhi into ash.

The destructive outburst reminded him that he was whole again, stronger than ever before. He had the sword of his own, that surpassed his father's fang in manifold terms of power.

What had sparked the sudden blaze of his power?

The battle flashed forward before his eyes, the memories of only a moment ago. His heart lurched and his free hand crept to his chest, clutching it. It leapt beneath the crevice of his steel ribs, pounding with a ferocity felt never before, pumping hot, flaming blood through every vein and artery.

This was not his heart. But it was. This was not his _past _heart, the stony, unfeeling one.

Ah, he could recall the moment.

The vile scent of Naraku had taunted at his nose, daring him to follow further. It was the pure, undiluted scent he despised; not an incarnate, not a puppet. Logically he chased the trail, anger stirred but cool and collected.

"You absorbed the half-demon," he noted when it was not Naraku, but another demon, another half-demonwith an even darker aura. An evil spirit with Naraku's body as its own dared taunt him.

"You're weak," it sneered at they fought at close quarters. "You're weak," the degrading voice seemed to echo.

In a bur of silent rage, anger bubbling beneath his smooth, icy mask, Sesshomaru fought without mercy, unleashing his swift fury. Tokijin snapped under the onslaught. The half-demon's poison overpowered his in a deafening round of conceited laughter. "You're weak," it repeated.

Sesshomaru widened his eyes in surprise, his claws sizzling from another's poison. It would have hurt if not for the willpower that clogged his veins. The assault of emotions, fury, pride, humiliation, disgust, erupted within him, his hatred overflowing from his stony heart.

Miasma, shadows, haze blurred his sight, tampered his senses. Too many coils, too many unclean half-demon limbs, too much he seethed to destroy. In a fit of rage he let loose his control, unleashing the giant, snarling beast of his greater form. He clawed and bit like a mad creature.

But Magatsuhi's poisons ate through his acid covered flesh, the steel-like full demon body. Sesshomaru fought, tore through the coils, but they only seemed to increase in their persistence. Claws and fangs thrashed, knowing that it was futile deep within his reason, but refusing to tarnish his pride.

Pride. Heavy pride, the armor around his heart. Little did he notice the dangers around him, dangers that could actually harm him, until poisoned tentacles shot through his chest, ripping with them the stony organ.

Suddenly Sesshomaru realized his heart was _gone._ He would _die_. The incredulous notion, one he ignored for centuries, enveloped in his conceited power, pierced through his ego. The armor, pride, around his heart shattered into a pile of steel dust. Potent poison infiltrated his body from the lethal wound. He burned with the corrosive liquid that stung from within his veins, killing him from the inside out. And then he was _dead._

In that moment's horror his spirit split from his body until he could see the pathetic, dying creature that was himself, without the narcissistic filter, without conceited masks.

Weak. He was weak. A mad beast torn apart, powerless fury in lifeless eyes.

Magatsuhi spoke the truth.

The remains of his body thrashed in indignity. No, he thought, no, no, too much had been left undone. Regret overpowered him, overpowered his pride, his humiliation. He could have been stronger; he could have found true meaning to his suddenly cut short life. Centuries passed, truly wasted? Why had he allowed his pride to overpower his true self? The empty puncture in his chest throbbed.

Did he not understand that others stronger than him existed? That the extents of power knew no bounds? Who was he, to consider himself the strongest? To look down upon the weaker? So many, too many, could overpower him. Even this half-breed filth, Magatsuhi, this half _human _spirit…

_What about her?_

The sight of his own dying body faded away from his spiritual eyes, replaced by the vision of _her_, Kagome, fully human, powerless against his claws and fangs but overpowering him with sheer willpower alone.

Regret, he realized. The pain racking through him was regret. The power imbuing each cell of his being was regret. That only lasted a split moment, until indignant pride took over his body and spirit.

This was the meager extent of his power, he thought with wrath, _this_ was all he could summon? He wanted _more_.

The picture of the lovely human smiled gently at him behind his eyes.

In that moment the coils around him exploded, blasted away by the aura of his metamorphosis, the manifestation of his true destructive nature. The Killing Perfect finally set fully free, unchallengeable, unstoppable. His heart grew within the confines of his chest, a new, flaming vesicle of passion to replace the lost heart of stone. A new blade formed in his restored hand, an answer to his summoning.

"Bakusaiga," he had whispered beneath the chorus of destruction, gazing at the reflection on the sword's flawless blade.

_"Kagome," _his heart whispered to him. It was her reflection that filled his vision, the girl who smiled, tolerated, loved, endured, all with eternal light and fearlessness as the beacon of salvation within her unbreakable spirit.

* * *

"Kikyo, please, wake up, I'm begging you. You're the strongest of us. No, no, not you too," a broken voice sobbed.

Sesshomaru found her sprawled on the floor of Naraku's latest stolen castle, holding the bodies of her fallen comrades. Silently he stood behind her.

"You," she gasped, turning to face him as she sensed his aura. "Sesshomaru," his name fell from her trembling lips.

"Why are you here?" he asked, frowning as he saw the lifeless bodies of his half-brother and his companions.

"They're all gone," she whispered, her voice a wisp floating in the dimness. "All of them. Inuyasha. Sango. Miroku. Shippo. Kirara. Kikyo. Gone." A pause of utter emptiness spaced each name as they tumbled from her tongue like bitter poison to one in the depths of despair, too bitter to swallow all at once, yet promising rest and darkness.

"You remain," he noted.

"You!" she cried out, her declaration a shushed scream. "You're the one who—" she closed her eyes and clutched herself in terror, striking and rubbing her porcelain skin as if trying to wipe away some deep and traumatic stain.

"Control yourself," he intoned, his face betraying no sign of his anger, walking forwards and lifting her chin with the thumb and forefinger of his new left arm. She shuddered and withdrew from his touch.

"Where were you all this time? All these weeks?" she cried, opening her eyes. Sesshomaru could see them now, the dark, lightless orbs of her eyes, bottomless pits of sorrow and despair. The tears that fell from those vats of void were murky, droplets tainted with her loss of light. She leaned forward and grasped his hand with her cold one. "Why weren't you here? If you came then they wouldn't have died! You could have killed Naraku! Killed Magatsuhi before he swallowed Naraku!"

"You place the responsibility of your weakness upon this Sesshomaru?" he shook away her weak hold coldly.

"You're right," she stammered, falling back limply, her dark eyes wide but unseeing. "My weakness," she whispered. "It's all my fault. If I had my powers, if I could have done _something_ even then, as a normal human. Something. Anything. It's all my fault," she fell forward on her hands, sobbing quietly. "I'm useless and weak."

"You are unscathed, are you not?" he observed, watching her bout of melancholy, golden eyes smoldering and churning despite the ice in his voice.

"I-I," she stared in horror at the blood covering her body, the blood of her friends upon her whole and unmarked skin. "I should join them. But I can't," she gasped, "I want the darkness to come, but it refuses to reach me."

"You are wrong," he said, "You are already hollowed by the relentless darkness."

"It hurts," she sobbed. "Please, Sesshomaru, kill me."

"Have you given up?" Sesshomaru asked softly, dangerously, his wrath at a boiling point beneath his calm exterior.

"I don't have the will to live anymore," she whimpered. His glowing eyes scrutinized with distain the lightlessness in hers, the way they dilated in darkness as if devoid of any life, incapable of seeing what lay before her.

Their gazes met for what felt like eternity, their bodies petrified in that moment.

A destructive feeling welled up inside him, a feeling called disappointment. It hurt him as he wanted to hurt her. She failed him, betrayed his submission! Just as he finally accepted defeat she lost to Naraku, to Magatsuhi, to the physical bodies that Sesshomaru could easily obliterate. How could she disappoint him so?

Her shudders broke the spell of petrifaction.

"Why?" Sesshomaru asked quietly, reining in his hurt.

"Too strong," she whispered. "The evil was too strong."

"Who?"

"Magatsuhi," she shivered.

"I cremated him," his left hand wrapped around her flinching throat, "with this left arm."

She stared up at him with fear in her eyes, that pushed him towards the brink of his control.

"Why are you afraid?" he uttered, his deep voice verging on guttural.

"It hurt," she choked. "My heart, my body hurts."

"A human like _you _overpowered my will," he spoke sadly, both hurt and hurtful. "Coward. Treacherous bitch. How could you? I-I-this Sesshomaru will teach you, teach you what to truly fear," his words wavered as his icy mask froze in place.

Boiling beneath his cold facade he dragged her to the castle depths, certain of the cruel instruments available there. It used to be Naraku's lair, after all. This time he spared no callousness handling her. He ignored the reactions of her delicate body and the strangled yelps of surprise from her throat where he held her, and her tongue, that had spoken such treacherous, weak-willed words.

Sesshomaru delighted in the way her body tore to accommodate him, the way her smooth, creamy skin split beneath the whip, how rope burned her thin wrists and chain scuffed the soft flesh to raise welts. With both arms whole he could use both to torment her, attacking both sides of her body, leaving neat clusters of ten bloody scratches, ten bloody crescents.

He heard bone fracture when he drove into her in one particularly rough thrust. Feeling that he liked the violent drive he kept up that merciless pace, until sick, guttural cries of pain wrenched from her throat, with the sound of cracking to accompany. His clawed hands roamed freely about every inch of her, sadistically meticulous to leave marks that maximized sensation wherever they went.

He wanted her to hurt. He wanted her to feel the hurt he felt, if but only in a mere fraction of physical pain. The flogger fell in fascination; the coals brought her to the sharp peak of sensation, eager to impale her upon it. But he wanted more than to break her, for she was already broken. He wanted her to hurt.

Pain.

Respite.

Greater pain.

Respite.

Augmented pain.

And it went on.

He pushed the limits of what her human body could withstand, manipulating pleasure as pain, twisting her senses in a myriad of pain, until pain and only pain remained in her consciousness. The cuffs on her wrists and ankles alone kept her from shriveling into a self-hating ball of misery. Yet still Sesshomaru forced her to struggle against her restrains, controlling her nerves like maneuvering the strings of a puppet.

"Betrayal," Sesshomaru hissed, sinking his fangs into her creamy breast. "Suffer for it."

She whimpered and flailed, evident that she felt the full force of his wrath despite her weak and fatigued responses. Satisfied, he found release and temporary freedom from the ache in his heart. Unlike their first time they floated in different seas; he in the warm, bloody sea of ecstasy and her crashing against the tides of agony.

"Suffer," he whispered. "Forget not this Sesshomaru and suffer for what you have failed." Firm flesh between her breasts parted obediently to his claws as he carved the three kanji of his name, taking his time with leisure and anticipating satisfaction when she screamed anew. Blood spilt over her smooth chest from slow gored strokes in murky rubies.

It was said, that calligraphy revealed personality; feelings, thoughts, intent. It was then, an everlasting reminder of the horrors between them, the malice he set upon her, and how he had been hurt by her and so hurt her. His brand on her body.

"Suffer," his whisper was but a lingering undertone beneath the cloak of darkness, as he at long last withdrew and left her as silently as when he arrived.

Whether she lived, or she died, his mark would remain upon her.

* * *

**Disappointment hurts more than the punishment dealt out itself. Sesshomaru admires and respects Kagome a great deal for her willpower, for her unbreakable spirit; but suddenly she _does _break, and beneath Magatsuhi's destruction of her friends. That sends Sesshomaru into a violent maelstrom of emotions. There's hurt pride for Magatsuhi accomplishing what Sesshomaru could not, breaking Kagome's willpower. What hurts even more, though, is how she lets Sesshomaru down. It's as if, the woman he worshipped all along is only a lifeless doll in the end. Painful. Traumatic. It only hurts Sesshomaru so much because his past encounter with her is so important to him; he really _is _obsessed with her. Sesshomaru takes this as betrayal, unsure of the hurt in his new heart, so he punishes Kagome. This _is _him, not some inner beast, but the actual, confused, and emotionally wounded Sesshomaru.**

**By the way, after he first rapes her, Sesshomaru tries to get away from her for a couple weeks. Magatsuhi then absorbs Naraku and kills Inuyasha and company. I'm just too despicable. **

**AdamiteAshes**


	4. What Is

**Four**

**What Is**

His limbs were numb, frozen if not for the potent poison that pumped through his veins. Even then the circulating crimson currents had slowed to a sluggish pace when his heart throbbed even more lethargically. If he could just move his limbs in the slightest, then perhaps he would be fully conscious of his senses.

But Sesshomaru merely stayed unmoving. As the near death experience before once again it seemed that his spirit had left his body, his mind roaming in a faraway, surreal place. Then suddenly, before his eyes of frozen amber, would appear a face, that face. Was that not…the face of the dead? One who could not be resurrected? A feminine face of beauty, marred by sorrow and sadistic victimization? The victim of his very own doing, and his undoing.

His awareness would suddenly slam back into his consciousness while his body stayed unmoving. Only the sudden flicker of gold and the thawing of amber in his eyes could reveal any secrets of an unthinkable mental journey.

Faintly his sharp ears were aware of pounding water, a heavy drum of the heavens bawling. Yet the sounding was but a shadow behind the throb of his heart, demanding his fighting spirit, demanding the neutrality that kept him going each and every repetitive day. Swollen droplets fell, tears from the skies. Beads of moisture gathered upon his silks, his skin, the steel, those silver locks, until an angry storm of fragile beads gathered and drenched the surfaces, below the surfaces. His shimmering bangs plastered themselves to his forehead, covering the midnight crescent, an inheritance from his mother, the reminder of his loveless heart.

It chilled him to the very bone, yet it was not the water that felt so cold. His contemplation was empty. What was left of his purpose in living? The emptiness left him with unspeakable sadness, dullness, coldness, numbness. As if in trance he lifted a hand, not feeling the limb. Empty golden eyes watched the splattering of rain while his pulsed thrummed in his ears.

Blood and water. Life and tears. Light and the lost. So lost in darkness, and yet…

"Sesshomaru-sama!"

…hope?

Sesshomaru turned his head slowly. The image of a bright and smiling human girl child reflected in his golden orbs. Pure, doe-like eyes smiled up at him, filled to the brim with admiration and adoration.

"Sesshomaru-sama is sad? The storm used to make Rin sad, but now Sesshomaru-sama is here, and Rin is not sad anymore when it rains," she spoke with curiosity and observation.

Sesshomaru saw soft, twinkling warm eyes imbued with life. His vision wavered, and he saw another pair of loving eyes in their place, heard another gentle voice. He half-blinked until narrowed eyes saw the smiling child again. He placed a murderer's hand lightly on her tasseled raven head in acknowledgment.

She smiled, a smile filled with love. But he was unworthy.

"Rin wishes that Lord Sesshomaru is happy," she said, her face alit with joy.

Sesshomaru peered into the boundless happiness within the child's eyes. Then he remembered when he first found her, when those beautiful eyes were disturbed by trauma, darkened and shielded by fear.

Yet he did not reject her for that. He took the child that dared love, and dared fear, and took her beneath his wing. He accepted her human strengths, her human weaknesses. He protected her gentle light.

Rin. Was it because she was a child?

In the centuries of his existence he had never before witnessed such light, spare for two creatures. Two humans. Two human females he encountered within one short month. Two young women with brilliant yet delicate human hearts.

Perhaps it was destiny, that he would meet the lights to his salvation at the same time. Those were the shining hearts that would bring peace to his dark soul. Pouring rain blurred the world around him, projecting the two beings that could affect his cold heart the most.

Rin. Kagome. One so near, another so far.

Why was that?

Why did he protect one, and destroy the other? Neither was unworthy, for he alone was the unworthy one. He was unworthy of the light, unworthy of his wretched existence.

Obviously his feelings, what little emotion he had from his stony and now reborn heart, directed his desires for each human on different paths. But for the woman Kagome, the one whom he destroyed, what was his heart's intention? What was the desire that stirred his blood, and the despair that slowed it?

As if in response his heart throbbed as if in pain, leaving him to wonder why he was so affected thus, and what affected him. It was pain, yet not pain either. He drummed long, pale fingers, only to feel nothing. Emptiness. It left him inclined to turn into stone, but also prompting him to seek some sort of physical response, if only he could find some purpose and meaning in life.

Empty. The resolve that kept him moving for centuries dissipated into nothing at all. The vivid desire to kill faded as if never existing before. The axis of his existence, spinning wildly after meeting her, rippled away into irreparable irregularity. Suddenly he wanted to ask, _"Why am I alive? What is the purpose of staying alive?" _Caught in the perplexities, he did not even heed the question, _"How ought I to live?_" It was not the hardships of life that hindered him, but the sudden loss of purpose, that hid even the basics of actually living. For the first time in his long and obliviously lonely life, Sesshomaru realized the meaning of emptiness.

He lifted his head, unfeeling of the cold, mourning rain that streamed down his snowy pale face. The sharp intensity in his eyes challenged streaks lightning that flashed through the rain-blurred heavens amongst bouts of roaring thunder. Sesshomaru was shaken, but not by the skies that shook around him.

He realized that it was misery. He was miserable.

By tearing into _her _body and will he had torn the emptiness within himself.

A lone demon sat within the storm.

He waited.

When the rain lifted it brought with it a heavy aura, soaking away darkness. Impurities washed away like a shower of forgiveness, slipping away into the giving earth to promise fertility and prosperity. An air of peace and life settled over a world cleaned of dust and grime. The skies regained their shine as the stormy clouds spent themselves on the rain and sped away with lightened loads to uncover the hidden sun. It shone with softness yet also vigor, setting the unpolluted forests aglow with nature's magic.

The God Tree always imbued the clearing around it with a magical atmosphere. It both spiked him blood and calmed him. When he laid hand on the Bone Eater's Well rim so many times before, it imbued him with a similar feeling. Thus he induced that the tree drew power off of the well and the well drew power off of the tree, for the tree forwent its wood to create the well, and the well acted as a medium to activate the powers of time within the God Tree.

What fed the aura of the God Tree? Was it really just simply mortal water and air, and the soil that rooted it? Was it enough for a simple tree to gain ludicrously grand powers?

When Sesshomaru set foot soundlessly next to the Bone Eater's Well, he instinctively knew that something was wrong. The magic in the air was off, was dull, but still alive like churning water within a dammed and swollen river. His fingered traced the marks sunken into the wood, left during his awaiting and stalking moments. But the familiar tingle of time-traveling power was gone. The wood was mere wood.

Yet he could not deny the magic in the air, stronger, sizzling against his skin, and more striking to his heart than ever before. He turned smoothly and walked steadily towards the God Tree, the boil of blood within his veins blazing and shaking him from within. With each step instincts told him to flee, but also to charge forwards and claim what was his. He did not understand until he reached the tree.

Fragrance and presence hit him harder than anything could in existence. The organ in his chest sputtered and went into standstill. With a shuddering hand he reached out for the enchanted wood, but lost his footing with a lightheaded feeling, falling as a mortal would.

How could a great demon, the strongest of the age, fall? How could a soaring warrior, with steps as light as air, stumble? Yet the aura in the atmosphere unbalanced him, drenching him with a chaotic mix of light elation and heavy foreboding. Like a fool, puppet to his emotions, he fell.

As soon as his back hit bark and he sunk down seated, Sesshomaru suddenly did not mind being a fool, or a puppet, as long as he could remain in that dream-like state. Warmth and familiarity washed over him. Her presence, the scent and light of his salvation enveloped him like a thick haze from dreamland.

His fingertips finally met the God Tree's trunk. The slightest contact sent electricity through his fingers. He felt more than wood. He felt _her_, her solid presence as if she was within the wood itself. _This_ was what drew him.

Sesshomaru felt peace for the first time since the months that he had left her.

"_No_," he thought as the reverie drew him in and drained him. _"There must be more. She is _alive."

The peace that fogged his mind cleared out bit by bit. Suddenly, there was his purpose. The reason to remain alive! The ultimate meaning to an endless life!

"Kagome," Sesshomaru roared, and he felt the God Tree pulse in response.

As if a barrier had lifted from his senses her scent flooded his nose, her body's warmth caressed his skin, and the soft, weak sound of breathing filled his ears. His eyes blurred with moisture from the sensory assault and something that had been dammed within his emptiness overflowed. He wanted to howl to the heavens in regret and hope and gratitude.

He realized that she was _here._

Sesshomaru stumbled forwards onto the roots of the God Tree, slashing the overgrown tangles with a mad fervor. When claws raked a barrier and shaky hands met silky skin, his heart seemed to leap up his throat. The world spun around him with only her, Kagome, as a fixed point of security. All the light from the heavens seemed to shine down upon him as he knelt before the body he dug, granting him the gift of opportunity, shining down with the light of hope.

She looked like the epitome of beauty to him, though bare and dusty. The paleness in her skin surfaced to a sickly extent but only likened her to a goddess in deep slumber. Despite the layers of a disheveled appearance only her beauty reached him, and left him in stupor. Her flesh was icy to the touch, like a frozen corpse, and it dissipated the warmth in his hand. In a brief moment of panic his hand swept up her chest, branded through his callous conquest, and found her heart, relieved by its exhausted thrum that she was, indeed, alive.

"Kagome," he murmured, gathering her weightless body into his arms.

Seeing the face that he longed to see, pale and bloodless rose-petal lips so close to his, he leaned forwards and pressed a soft and tender kiss to those icy petals. Her eyes fluttered open as a princess would awake from a spell by one chosen kiss.

Yet it was emptiness that replaced the light in her eyes.

"I'm still alive," she said, her murky eyes unseeing as if she was speaking to herself, with only disappointment barely perceivable in her emotionless statement.

"Why are you here?" Sesshomaru asked.

She did not so much as flinch when his fingers swept gently across her face and tucked back raven locks, and his smoldering gaze perused every inch of her bare body. Gently he wrapped her in his haori.

"It's you," she finally seemed to acknowledge, even though she moved not a muscle and her eyes remained unseeing. "Have you come to kill me now? Or will you rape me again?"

"How long have you been here? Have you been here all these months? Kagome," he choked, hardly preventing her name from trembling on his tongue.

"It's been that long?" she said dully, finally lifting her head listlessly. "I've only been sitting here all along."

"Why are you like this?" he asked, pained, and he instantly knew it was a foolish question. It was by his hateful doing.

"Why should I live? What left is there to live for?" Kagome said dryly, cold and without voice, as if each word was uttered without purpose. "Why am I alive when they are dead? Why am I not dead when you are alive? You ask me why, Sesshomaru?"

"You have gotten so cold," he whispered, his hot breath ghosting across her chest as he laid an ear on her heart and listened to the proof that life still flowed within her veins, while his fingers traced the scars that spelled his name, the only marks left upon her physical body.

"I am tired," she said.

"Why do you not resist me?"

"I am weary. The matters of this world no longer concern me."

"Then what does?"

"Sesshomaru," she whispered. Her cold gaze met his, and faltered like ice melted by fire. "Let me go. Extinguish this life. Kill me."

"You requested the same thing before," he said softly against her heart, slipping a hand around her waist. "And my answer?" Sesshomaru pressed his lips to hers.

"No."

Carrying her against his chest, determined to show that he did care, that she needed to live on, he divested their coverings and relished the physical contact of skin on skin between them that never faltered. She was his salvation, and now he would become hers.

"Live," he said, spreading his warm into her body.

Her expression remained blank and cold, but he could envision the blood quickening beneath snowy skin.

"Why?" she asked. "I cannot feel. I cannot love."

"You can," he refuted, sealing her lips and joining their bodies, bringing every inch of her flesh to life with his. He watched as she writhed involuntarily, drawing out her pleasure and caressing her body until she arched. It was so warm, so soft, so tender and unlike him, that he realized he had truly changed, evolved. When he shared the life in his flesh with her, he felt something within himself blossoming, and suddenly life was all worth living.

"I can't," she moaned, the trickling of tears seeping through thawed surface ice. "It consumes me."

"If not for love," he breathed as he brought her soaring and floating with him in euphoria, wishing to never let go. "If not for love, then live for hate. Avenge yourself. But live."

"I can't," she cried, shivering in his embrace.

"You can," he said, igniting the fires within her once more.

Even as they lay spent and glowing Sesshomaru never let go, never stopped the caresses that brought life and warmth back into her.

"Let go of me," she murmured against his chest.

"You will never be free of life."

"I hate you."

She vanished, faded without a trace into the magic infused air, leaving his arms empty but his heart full.

He knew that she lived on.

* * *

**It's been a month long delay! Fortunately, I've taken advantage of the time and plotted out a huge chunk of the storyline. Currently:**

**Kagome has entered the I-don't-care-I-don't-know stage of completely feeling empty. Sesshomaru finally realizes that he doesn't really hate her. He finds a purpose to living by finding her, after months and months with his assault and departure. He snaps Kagome out of the I-don't-care-I-don't-know stage by provoking her to hate him and thus have a purpose of living. **

**Thus they live on, and the story will follow through time.**

**AdamiteAshes**


End file.
